


Being Alive

by Angy98



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-21
Updated: 2021-02-21
Packaged: 2021-03-18 07:34:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 951
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29606037
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Angy98/pseuds/Angy98
Summary: Even the smallest things become precious, if you risk losing them forever.
Relationships: Gabriel Agreste | Papillon | Hawk Moth/Nathalie Sancoeur
Comments: 3
Kudos: 28
Collections: GabeNath Book Club and Art Club Server





	Being Alive

Still half-asleep, Gabriel rolled in bed on his side, reaching out for his partner where he knew he would find her. His hand fell back down on an empty half of the bed, and her unexpected absence made him wake up completely. He and Nathalie usually woke up together to the sound of the alarm clock.

Now that he thought about it, he didn’t hear the alarm clock ringing.

Gabriel turned around and grabbed his glasses to check the time on the clock. It was pretty early in the morning; the alarm wouldn’t have gone off before another good thirty minutes.

He stood up from the bed, deciding he could as well get up and look for his Nathalie.

The man walked along the mansion’s halls, dimly lit by the rays of a sun that still hadn’t fully raised. He found his partner in the kitchen, with a blanket on her shoulders and a mug of coffee in her hands, staring out of the window.

“Hey,” he whispered as he got closer to her, in order not to startle her by using too high of a voice tone. The attempt proved itself to be futile, though, as Nathalie still turned around with a sharp motion, relaxing when she acknowledged it was him. “Good morning,” the woman greeted him as he walked up to her.

“You’re up early!”

“Yeah... I woke up to go to the bathroom but then I heard birds chirping outside and I decided to stay up and listen. We never have time to enjoy the quietness of the morning, but we should definitely try to do it more. The birds’ chirping is such a relaxing sound to listen to!” Nathalie smiled up to Gabriel. Then, her gaze shifted back to the mansion’s garden outside. “It reminds me of my grandfather’s house; he lived in the countryside, and we used to visit him often when I was a child. It was much quieter, where he lived, and you could hear birds singing every morning. I really liked it. My parents are more of a city type of people, but there are sounds that you don’t always get to hear in the middle of the city.”

“I didn’t know you were such a… nature-loving kind of person,” Gabriel said, bringing a hand up to brush some of her hair into place.

“I am not. Well, I  _ was  _ not.” Nathalie lowered her gaze. “But you start to look at things differently if you risk never being able to live them again.”

Gabriel froze and drew his hand back, suddenly feeling like he didn’t deserve to be that close to her. It was his fault alone if she had to fight so hard against the mysterious magical illness that almost took her away. She would have never gotten ill in the first place, if it wasn’t for him and his damned, foolish ideas.

Nathalie noticed the way her partner’s expression dropped, and reached out for him to make him look back at her. “Don’t get me wrong; I am not regretting what I did. When I said I would have given my life for you, I meant it. I still do.” The woman said, her gaze soft but firm at the same time. “It’s just that… as determined as I was to help you, when my condition started getting worse I got scared.”

He knew it, of course. Nathalie always tried to hide her every doubt and concern in order not to make him second-guess his plans, but there were nights where he was kept awake by his magical brooch, his breath cut short by the intensity of Nathalie’s fear clutching his chest as if it was his own.

On one particularly bad night, Duusu flew over to Gabriel’s room, begging the man to come and help her friend. Rushing over to Nathalie’s room, Gabriel found her trembling under the blankets, all curled up on herself crying through a harsh cough fit.

It was the first time he’d witnessed her crying, and the way she desperately clung to him that night as he rubbed her back, trying to soothe her cough and her sobs, was still burned in the back of his mind.

“When I finally healed for good, all I could think about was how amazing it felt to even be able to...  _ breathe normally _ !” Nathalie went on. “I started paying more attention to my own body, to the way it felt to move, to breathe in and out, to do the smallest things. Every now and then, I focus more on the feeling of wind blowing on my skin, on how food tastes, on how yours and Adrien’s voices sound…” She explained, smiling as her mind retraced each sensation.

Gabriel listened to the birds chirping, his gaze locked on Nathalie’s soft smile as she stared outside. He hadn’t actually paid attention to any of those things in a very long time, he realized. Maybe he never did at all. 

“You will definitely have to teach me that,” he spoke, trying to consciously move his attention to his hand and to the feeling of his fingers intertwined with Nathalie’s. The woman turned to him, failing to get what he meant with that sentence. “How to… pay attention to the small things, I mean.” Gabriel explained himself. “I tend to stay too much in my own head, but you probably already know this...” He then added, giving her an apologetic smile.

“Of course!” Nathalie smiled in turn, moving closer to give him a kiss on his forehead.

Gabriel made a coffee for himself and then went back to Nathalie’s side, holding her close as they both enjoyed the rare moment of quiet.


End file.
